Yaya
given name · Latin script
Meaning: A nanny; female caregiver; nursemaid
Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published
/jaja/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Yaya is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country. In Mali it is the 35th most common given name.
- CMCameroon≈1 in 1.4M(inferred from the name graph)
- ESSpain1 in 68K
- SESweden1 in 117K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- United States (measured from records)
- Sources
- 206 (measured from records)
- 1 in 68K (inferred from the name graph)
844 people, 2020
Highest-authority source
Spain
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
A nanny; female caregiver; nursemaid
Sources 1
- kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Attested across 2 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Yaya counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | — | 844 | 1 in 394K | 440 | Yaya | 104 |
| ES Spain | — | 734 | 1 in 68K | 734 | Yaya | 31 |
| SE Sweden | — | 87 | 1 in 117K | 87 | — | 6 |
| NL Netherlands | — | 24 | 1 in 720K | 22 | — | 7 |
| CM Cameroon | #100 | ≈20 est. | ≈1 in 1.4M | listed | Yaya | 20 |
| FI Finland | — | 14 | 1 in 398K | 40 | — | 2 |
| ML Mali | #35 | — | — | 5 | Yaya | 24 |
844 people counted by Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex, 2020. Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: the masakhane register; INE — Padrón per-token widgets (current living counts, given + apellidos); Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Wikidata humans by citizenship — given & family names; Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population); DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register); DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup); Meertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (all-time BRP bearer counts, 2018); CBG Familienamenbank — Dutch surname bearer counts (GBA/BRP 2007). Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
Yaya is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In Swahili, elder sister
as a nameAfrican Muslim Names
In Swahili, brother
as a nameAfrican Muslim Names
Child’s nurse.
as a nameThe African book of names
In Filipino, nanny; nursemaid; female caregiver/caretaker; amah (girl or woman employed to take care of children)
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In Turkish, pedestrian; someone walking, instead of using a vehicle
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Yahya Jammehb. 1965GMnot in their usual name2nd President of the Gambia
- Yaya DaCostab. 1982USAmerican actress and model
- Yaya Hanb. 1982CNAmerican cosplayer, model and costume designer
- Yaya Matsushimab. 1982JPJapanese AV idol
- Yaya Touréb. 1983CIIvorian association football player
- Moussa Dembéléb. 1987BEnot in their usual nameBelgian association football player (born 1987)
- Yaya Soumahorob. 1989CIIvorian footballer
- Banana Yayab. 1991CMCameroonian association football player
- Yaya Sanogob. 1993FRFrench footballer (born 1993)
- Sphephelo Sitholeb. 1999ZAnot in their usual nameSouth African association football player
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
How to address them(machine-generated)
A formal English salutation is built on the surname, so it needs a full name — on its own, a first name only supports the informal form.
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 58 sources across 35 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ES Spain | INE — Padrón per-token widgets (current living counts, given + apellidos) | — | 734 | #3,548 |
| ES Spain | INE — Nombres más frecuentes (Padrón Municipal) | — | 632 | #1,773 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 440 | #14,066 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 404 | #14,066 |
| SE Sweden | Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population) | — | 87 | #9,382 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 40 | #8,338 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 40 | #8,216 |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2020 | 27 | — |
| ES Spain | INE — Nombres más frecuentes (Padrón Municipal) | — | 22 | #26,000 |
| NL Netherlands | Meertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (all-time BRP bearer counts, 2018) | — | 14 | #18,281 |
| NL Netherlands | Meertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (all-time BRP bearer counts, 2018) | — | 10 | #17,921 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register) | — | 7 | — |
Reference works 5
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
- Ethiopian name tokens (GitHub lehagere/ethiopian-names, 40/60 condominium list)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- What does the name Yaya mean, and where does it come from?
- A nanny; female caregiver; nursemaid Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
- Is Yaya a male or female name?
- Yaya is recorded for both men and women. We don't publish a percentage split: a record's gender belongs to the person and is attached to every given name on that record, so names in cultures where a name string also carries a parent's or spouse's given name pick up large cross-gender counts.
- How do you pronounce Yaya?
- A machine transcription gives /jaja/ (IPA) for French.
- What are other forms of the name Yaya?
- In the etymology graph, Yayo is a form of the same name in other languages.
- In which country does Yaya have the most bearers?
- In the United States, the national register counted about 844 people named Yaya, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled yaya.
- Where is Yaya most common?
- Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Yaya is densest in Spain — about 1 in 68 thousand people — even though United States holds more of our records for it.
- How common is the name Yaya?
- In the United States, the national register counted 844 people named Yaya in 2020, about 1 in 394 thousand residents.
- How common is Yaya compared with other names?
- In Mali, Yaya is the 35th most common given name of 2,109 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Yaya?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/yayaThe payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Yaya” — the 35th most common given name in Mali. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.